(Newser)
–
Hospitals in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and other major US cities don't have the emergency room capacity to handle even a moderate terrorist attack, a congressional committee says. A survey last month of 34 hospitals revealed they could not handle a sudden surge of trauma victims, a situation described in the report as "truly alarming," reports USA Today.

"If a terrorist attack had occurred when we did our survey, the consequences would have been catastrophic," said Rep. Henry Waxman. "The emergency care systems were stretched to the breaking point and had no capacity to respond to a surge of victims."